Monday, November 30, 2009

GOP keeping up advantage with independents

Earlier this month Republicans won the contests for Governor of New Jersey and Virginia, thanks in large part to overwhelming margins of victory among independents.

There's no indication from the polling we've done in the four weeks since the election that the trend will change in 2010. In five out of six races we've looked at in Arkansas, Missouri, North Carolina, and Wisconsin the likely Republican nominee continues to hold a double digit lead with independents:

Office

Republican Margin w/Independents

Wisconsin Governor

Scott Walker up 43-28 vs. Tom Barrett

North Carolina Senate

Richard Burr up 51-30 vs. Generic Dem

Arkansas-2

Tim Griffin up 49-34 vs. Vic Snyder

Missouri Senate

Roy Blunt up 44-32 vs. Robin Carnahan

Arkansas Senate

Gilbert Baker up 47-25 vs. Blanche Lincoln

The one exception is the Wisconsin Senate race where Russ Feingold leads with independents against all three of the Republicans we tested against him.

Of course it's always worth keeping in mind with independents that they have a structural lean toward the GOP, particularly with Republican id levels hitting new lows in some polls, because far more of them are conservatives than liberals:

State

Liberal

Moderate

Conservative

Arkansas

3

60

37

Missouri

9

50

40

North Carolina

11

49

41

Wisconsin

8

58

34

That said, there's no doubt it will be a brutal year for Democrats if they can't perform better with independent voters, and in the month following losses in New Jersey and Virginia there's no indication they're getting it turned around.

2 comments:

Timothy
said...

I thought the loss if independent voters wasn't the reason for Obama's losses in NJ and VA (and they are his losses since he's the titular head of the democrat party). I thought it was because his base didn't turn out.

Gallup is showing the number of GOP identifiers down by about 5 percent and independents up about the same since November 2008. Could the surge in GOP support among independents be related to the more GOP-flavored composition of Independents today?